ChinaFile posted an article titled, “The Origins of China’s New Law on Foreign NGOs.” The article reads in part as follows;

“In March of 2013, Xi Jinping was named the President of the People’s Republic of China at the 12th National People’s Congress. At the time, I was working for China Development Brief, an independent Chinese NGO started by the British journalist Nick Young in 1996 to promote constructive engagement between China and international development organizations.

I remember that month well because we were busy preparing for the launch of our directory of independent Chinese NGOs and a report on public advocacy in China. That event was a celebration of the substantial growth in independent civil society organizations over the last decade. It was also a coming out party for China Development Brief, after a period of assuming a low profile after Nick was denied entry back into China in 2007 for reasons that have never been made clear. Nick’s English-language website had stopped posting content a short time afterwards.

To promote a new NGO directory (our first since 2005) and advocacy report, we held a day-long Civil Society Forum in the U.S. Embassy’s American Center. We invited over a hundred representatives from independent Chinese NGOs, foreign NGOs, diplomats, scholars, and media, and asked several Chinese NGOs to speak about the significance of the directory and their advocacy experiences in China.”